DAVIS, Calif.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--

The OpenFold Consortium, a leading open-science initiative developing AI foundation models for biomolecular structure prediction, today announced that Dr. Jan Domanski has joined the consortium as senior science lead. In this role, Dr. Domanski will spearhead scientific innovation, engineering excellence, and ecosystem growth as OpenFold advances its mission to democratize access to high-performance AI models for structural biology and drug discovery. He will work closely with Dr. Jennifer Wei, OpenFold’s senior technical lead, and a global network of academic and industry contributors to build an open, modular software stack that links state-of-the-art AI models with rich experimental and simulation data to improve model generalization and robustness for drug discovery.

“Dr. Domanski embodies the spirit of OpenFold: a deep scientific understanding of proteins coupled with professional engineering expertise and a builder’s mindset,” said Dr. Woody Sherman, Chair of the OpenFold Executive Committee. “His experience architecting AI-driven platforms to drive drug discovery programs from concept to clinic will be invaluable as we expand OpenFold’s reach beyond structure prediction toward accurate biomolecular interactions, dynamics, and generative design.”

As part of the Open Molecular Software Foundation (OMSF), OpenFold is committed to advancing open and reproducible science across molecular modeling. Following the preview release of OpenFold3, an open-source model capable of predicting protein, nucleic acid, and small-molecule interactions with near–AlphaFold 3 accuracy, the consortium is now focused on building the next generation of foundation models that integrate AI and physics-based approaches for biomolecular understanding and drug discovery.

“OpenFold has already proven that open collaboration can match or exceed the capabilities of proprietary AI models,” said Dr. Domanski. “The next phase is to make these models truly usable and extensible—to enable every scientist, from academia to biotech, to contribute, adapt, and apply them across new frontiers of biology and medicine.”

Dr. Domanski brings over a decade of experience at the intersection of machine learning, molecular simulation, and scientific software development. With a Ph.D. obtained through the NIH Oxford-Cambridge Scholars Program, a joint program between the University of Oxford and the NIH, he studied membrane protein folding under the supervision of Professors Mark Sansom and Philip Stansfeld at Oxford and Dr. Robert Best at the NIH. Dr. Domanski has dedicated his career to building tools that bridge cutting-edge computation with experimental science to accelerate drug discovery and innovation in the life sciences. Dr. Domanski also worked at D. E. Shaw Research where he applied the long timescale molecular dynamics simulations to small-molecule discovery, understanding the relationship between protein structure and function.

Prior to joining OpenFold, Dr. Domanski was Founder and CTO of Labstep, a pioneering digital lab automation platform acquired by STARLIMS. In 2022, Dr. Domanski joined Charm Therapeutics, where he was among the first five employees. There, he built and scaled the company’s machine learning and software engineering teams, collaborated closely with medicinal chemists and structural biologists, and led the development of DragonFold, a state-of-the-art co-folding model that powered Charm’s integrated small-molecule discovery platform. This technology contributed to the identification of CHM-029, Charm’s next-generation menin inhibitor expected to enter the clinic in 2026.

The OpenFold Consortium is supported by member organizations and philanthropic partners. By investing in OpenFold today, you have a unique opportunity to shape the future of open, trustworthy AI infrastructure in the life sciences, ensuring that state-of-the-art models remain freely accessible to scientists everywhere.

If you or your organization are excited to support open, community-driven AI for science, please contact Dr. Mallory Tollefson at [email protected]. Your support helps accelerate discovery, empower the next generation of scientists, and sustain critical tools that the entire biomedical ecosystem relies on.

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Source: OpenFold